I believe my first post was exactly what Proco needed in this case. It certainly addressed the actual questions by pointing out some of the major factors involved in estimating resources required and expected outcomes.

I saw no request for war stories in the opening post.

Further, my response gave several hints about traps to avoid, simply by pointing out what needed to be measured.

If what I said is in the ITIL books, then so be it. I don't have access to the books to see what they say. Perhaps (with luck) I have condensed or focussed or distilled that information. Perhaps not. I could have just said read the books.

The question was:
"How many staff do I need on my help desk?".

The answer is:
"That can only be determined by first measuring all the relevant variables. Reference to the solution in any other environment can be dangerously misleading and validating such reference requires even more variables to be measured and more judgements to be made."

I can guess what managements response would be if you go back later and say "Well, Bloggs and Co. did it with three full-time staff, but it turns out that they added two more a month after I asked them about it."_________________"Method goes far to prevent trouble in business: for it makes the task easy, hinders confusion, saves abundance of time, and instructs those that have business depending, both what to do and what to hope."
William Penn 1644-1718

Posted: Sat Aug 09, 2008 12:34 am Post subject: Re: How many Service Desk Staff and first line resolution?

Proco2020 wrote:

Hi,

New here so be gentle!.

Well you've not been gentle, but thanks!

Proco2020 wrote:

I think this has been covered in various places on the forum but not really found an answer.

If you have an average of 1300 Service Requests and Incidents raised per month, how many Service Desk (first line) operatives would you expect to cover a 10 hour shift (8am to 6pm)

I wasn't looking to engage a consultant for this and I'm sure you can apply a formula and still find your staff are either over stretched or sat round doing nothing as you've missed something or the stats are not accurate enough but I'm sure there is a general rule of thumb that those on the coal face could apply.

My belief is that it is between 4 and 5 due to the hours being covered the volume of work and the average time it does take to just "log and flog" let alone actually try and resolve while on the phone.

I have found a statement that backs up my thoughts but wanted real world experience.

Proco2020 wrote:

The second question is what percentage of first line fixes (not first time fixes) would you expect there to be e.g. calls not requiring a technical escalation.

I'm sorry if this has been covered many times before and I look forward to your answers.

OK this is a bit vague but then again someone who is actually doing the job would have real world experience (that term again). Mine is that an average of 50% + are resolved on First Line but I wanted to see if this bared up with other peoples experiences.

Thanks to BB for his support and understanding of what I was looking for rather than to engage a consultant to confirm what I already thought.

There's no magic formula because every organisation is different. It's not about hiring a consultant... So when you say 4 or 5 well I have no idea what that factors in. My first post said 4 or 5 and I just picked a number out of thin air!

This is starting to seem like a circular debate, let's all stop now because it's not getting anywhere.

At the risk of sounding rude Proco has clarified that he is looking for the benefit of some real world experience rather than 'book-talk' - if all you can add is "it depends" or "its not simple" or "its complicated because" then thats clearly not helping - if you can't help then perhaps it would be better to find a post where you can.

And despite what you appear to think about our responses, we are trying to answer the question

I will put another stab at it.. I think I posted a formula in anearlier

I have beent there more than one. I did not ask any one.

I did 2 things.

Analyse the current situation. - easy if you know how to analyse
Make the decision and have a justification - that is the Manager's role

But hey.. you want something... here ya go

Please note tanstaafl!!!

Your numbers of 1300 a month

My question: Is that a 7dx10h a week or a 5d10h
On a 7 day cycle
This would be 43 per day on a 30 day cycle or 4.3 per hour on a 10 hour day - which would mean an average of one ticket every 13.95 minute
On a 5 day cycle
This would be 260 per day or 26 per hour or 1 every 2.6 minutes

How much backlog is there of tickets ?
How long are tickets opened.
Does the SD merely create, update close or fire off to other group and forget or do they have to track the ticket through the life of it

Big difference

On a day's period over the 10 hours, what is the distribution of calls - how many at what time of day

On a weeks' period on each day of the week, what is the distribution of calls

My question:
What is the primary method for the SD personnel to be contacted by the users - email, phone, physical visit

Does the user community come to the SD for every thing or are there FAQ and automated SD answer tools that filter the lint

My questions:

For incidents, is there a NMS tool ?
Is there a minimum time the incident has to be active before action taken
Are there OLAs or SLAs (if you manage external customer equipment)
Is there external SD or helpdesk that filter things to you

what is the expected skill set for the SD staff
What is the actual skill set for the SD staff
what technical admin rights do they have - sudo priviledges, remote access rights to machines etc, sys admin rights to servers etc

My question: Does the phone call system have a built Call manager process - you know - for microsoft issues - hanfg up and reboot; for unix, press 1 for email press 2
My question: for your phone calls & if you are an ACD system, what is the average length of the telephone calls and what is the average number of calls per hour per seat

That said, the number of staff needed for any Service Desk/helpdesk / noc is dependent on how much ££$$ the corp is willing to allow the departmetnt to spend on staff, the type of support that is given, the level of support that is given and the hours the users can be provided support

If you are the SD manager, you have to justified what ever number you say the SD should have. If you say 4 or 5, which UJ said - i believe, and your boss asks you - where did you get the numbers, say I went to this forum and UJ say 4 or 5 was the optinum number. I wonder what his response is.... giggle_________________John Hardesty
ITSM Manager's Certificate (Red Badge)

Without taking any risks, I'll just say that the benefits of real world experience can only be realized by applying them in detailed analysis and thus reaching a reasonable estimate.

There is no other way to help.

The medium risk approach is to take the industry average (if you can find it) and make an assumption as to where you stand on the line.

The high risk approach is to find two or three people who will happily give you a number and assume a) that they know what they are talking about and b) that there experience happens to coincide with your own situation.

Doing the sums does not give you decimal point accuracy. It gives you the best approximation available. It also provides you with the baseline to compare against your implementation and thus the first step for future refinement and improvement._________________"Method goes far to prevent trouble in business: for it makes the task easy, hinders confusion, saves abundance of time, and instructs those that have business depending, both what to do and what to hope."
William Penn 1644-1718

And despite what you appear to think about our responses, we are trying to answer the question

I will put another stab at it.. I think I posted a formula in anearlier

I have beent there more than one. I did not ask any one.

I did 2 things.

Analyse the current situation. - easy if you know how to analyse
Make the decision and have a justification - that is the Manager's role

But hey.. you want something... here ya go

Please note tanstaafl!!!

Your numbers of 1300 a month

My question: Is that a 7dx10h a week or a 5d10h
On a 7 day cycle
This would be 43 per day on a 30 day cycle or 4.3 per hour on a 10 hour day - which would mean an average of one ticket every 13.95 minute
On a 5 day cycle
This would be 260 per day or 26 per hour or 1 every 2.6 minutes

How much backlog is there of tickets ?
How long are tickets opened.
Does the SD merely create, update close or fire off to other group and forget or do they have to track the ticket through the life of it

Big difference

On a day's period over the 10 hours, what is the distribution of calls - how many at what time of day

On a weeks' period on each day of the week, what is the distribution of calls

My question:
What is the primary method for the SD personnel to be contacted by the users - email, phone, physical visit

Does the user community come to the SD for every thing or are there FAQ and automated SD answer tools that filter the lint

My questions:

For incidents, is there a NMS tool ?
Is there a minimum time the incident has to be active before action taken
Are there OLAs or SLAs (if you manage external customer equipment)
Is there external SD or helpdesk that filter things to you

what is the expected skill set for the SD staff
What is the actual skill set for the SD staff
what technical admin rights do they have - sudo priviledges, remote access rights to machines etc, sys admin rights to servers etc

My question: Does the phone call system have a built Call manager process - you know - for microsoft issues - hanfg up and reboot; for unix, press 1 for email press 2
My question: for your phone calls & if you are an ACD system, what is the average length of the telephone calls and what is the average number of calls per hour per seat

That said, the number of staff needed for any Service Desk/helpdesk / noc is dependent on how much ££$$ the corp is willing to allow the departmetnt to spend on staff, the type of support that is given, the level of support that is given and the hours the users can be provided support

If you are the SD manager, you have to justified what ever number you say the SD should have. If you say 4 or 5, which UJ said - i believe, and your boss asks you - where did you get the numbers, say I went to this forum and UJ say 4 or 5 was the optinum number. I wonder what his response is.... giggle

Posted: Sat Aug 09, 2008 10:44 am Post subject: Re: How many Service Desk Staff and first line resolution?

Proco2020 wrote:

I wasn't looking to engage a consultant for this and I'm sure you can apply a formula and still find your staff are either over stretched or sat round doing nothing as you've missed something or the stats are not accurate enough but I'm sure there is a general rule of thumb that those on the coal face could apply.

My belief is that it is between 4 and 5 due to the hours being covered the volume of work and the average time it does take to just "log and flog" let alone actually try and resolve while on the phone.

I have found a statement that backs up my thoughts but wanted real world experience.

Proco2020 wrote:

OK this is a bit vague but then again someone who is actually doing the job would have real world experience (that term again). Mine is that an average of 50% + are resolved on First Line but I wanted to see if this bared up with other peoples experiences.

If you have included those figures in your original post, the answer would be different, for we know that you have spent effort in calculating and you need insights or clarification for that.

chipmunks to answer the phone
avoid scottish terriers as the brogue is usually harsh
avoid weasels because they are .... well....weasels ....
ferrets are OK but dont have them in the same room with the rabbits

and of course

squirrels are the best for change and release staff
but dont let them implement the change / release package

they have a tendancy to put them somewhere and lose them until next springtime_________________John Hardesty
ITSM Manager's Certificate (Red Badge)

1. Real Scotties do not wear brogues.
2. Scotties have the tenacity to keep chasing second line until they deliver.

Perhaps you just had a bad experience with some Anglicised Scottie?_________________"Method goes far to prevent trouble in business: for it makes the task easy, hinders confusion, saves abundance of time, and instructs those that have business depending, both what to do and what to hope."
William Penn 1644-1718